Beef, Pork Crisis Threatens Region

CANADA - A crisis in beef farming is intensifying, even though a three-year ban on exporting Canadian cattle to the United States finally has been lifted.

20 November 2007

2 minute read

North America

*
This crisis now is worse than at (the time of) BSE. Feedlot operators, cow-calf operations and processors are affected.

Ian McKillop, a Dutton-area farmer and head of the Ontario Cattlemen's Association.

Yesterday, the first Canadian cattle older than 30 months, along with breeding cattle, crossed the Canadian border into the U.S.

At the same time, Ontario cattle and hog farmers are getting such poor prices that many will find it tough to stay afloat.

"I firmly believe that 30 to 35 per cent of beef farmers are going to be gone because of the pricing issue," said Jim Clark, executive director of the Woodstock-based Ontario Cattle Feeders Association.

In May 2003, a case of bovine spongiform encephaly (BSE, or mad cow disease) in an Alberta cow shut the border to the U.S. and shook the beef industry. Since then, the ban has been eased and now fully lifted.

That's heartening, especially to cattle breeders, who haven't been able to export south of the border since May 2003.

But beef prices have dropped by one-third since spring, said Ian McKillop, a Dutton-area farmer and head of the Ontario Cattlemen's Association.

"This crisis now is worse than at (the time of) BSE," McKillop said. Feedlot operators, cow-calf operations and processors are affected.

Source: London Free Press